How does an ME change to non-ME?

January 29, 2008 2:37 PM

What else can a Mechanical Engineer do?

I am a degreed Engineer, but I am highly dissatisfied with my career choice. I have taken personality tests and even paid big bucks to see a career counselor to assess a new career. I have seen several options as an ISFP personality type, but they all seem to earn significantly less money than I do now (due to assuming entry level positions). I was wondering if there were any non-engineering options where my knowledge base would be transferable. My career counselor was not very helpful in this regard. I have experience in electrical utilities and manufacturing. I am hoping the hive mind might offer more suggestions.

posted by senador to work & money (20 comments total)

If you don't mind going back to school - Patent lawyer

or possibly even one step further, work as a patent lawyer for a few years, go back again for an MBA, work for a VC firm or hedge fund doing IP valuation.

You can always go a duel J.D./M.B.A. route and save a few years.
posted by Arbac at 2:41 PM on January 29, 2008

I know a guy where I work that did the engineer -> patent lawyer route. if you are interested, i may be able to give you his contact information.
posted by ArgentCorvid at 2:55 PM on January 29, 2008

As a currently employed BS in ME, I'd first wonder what it is that you don't particularly like about being an engineer? Many of my coworkers (myself included) all hold the job title of engineer, but do things more along the lines of project management and resource coordination. If it's the calculations and theory that you're growing weary of, there are other venues that will leverage your technical background in a broader way (think construction, oil, other large companies with lots of resources and money but need help organizing them).
posted by conradjones at 3:08 PM on January 29, 2008

Currently I am doing something along the lines of project managment. I have worked in the design/theory area also. The biggest problem I have been having is not having a personal impact on people. I guess I want something where I help people and make more of a community/global/individual difference not just making widgets. I enjoyed my utility work more than my current position, because I felt I had more of an impac to my companies customers (people like having electricity). All the engineering jobs I know about are so far removed from the human aspect. Its all resources, numbers, theory, planning. I just can't really get excited about that. I don't always expect to like my job, but I want some personal satisfaction and I really never felt that Engineering has provided me any personal satisfaction.
posted by senador at 3:22 PM on January 29, 2008

You're probably well-qualified to teach science.
posted by SBMike at 3:41 PM on January 29, 2008

Well, I can only talk about software because that's what I know, but support engineer and sales engineer are both customer-facing roles...maybe a position like that at a company that makes mechanical engineering software, which would leverage your knowledge?
posted by phoenixy at 3:43 PM on January 29, 2008

Is it the work itself or working for someone else? I know several PE's in ME that run their own consulting business doing forensic engineering. Of course that still involves the engineering element, but you make you r own hours and pick your own cases.
posted by sanka at 3:56 PM on January 29, 2008

Holy crap, I could be you in N years [I don't actually know how old you are].

I didn't mean that in a self-centered way. I work as an engineer now. It's just that I had/have the same problem, and being a young thing, can only speak to the minimal experience I have. Things I considered were:

- Business/management consulting with a major firm: Quantitative and analytical skills are always a good thing to have, and are easily transferable. This seems kind of hard to do if you're not straight out of school (so you're moldable) or a very well-established expert with a metric ton of knowledge to leverage, though.
- Financial services: I had a number of friends who took their engineering degrees and ran to crunch numbers for investment banks. Seems to pay better, too.
- Not to hit you over the head with it like everyone else, but consider a legal career. You could also possibly be a patent agent without going the whole JD route, but you'd make considerably less than someone with the law degree. This was the other option for friends who ditched the lab.
- Tech writing: I don't know much about this path, but it seems that if you're able to grasp technical concepts, and summarize and present them well, this is a good option. Downside is that most jobs I've seen for this require X years of experience doing high-level tech writing. I have no idea how to get started here.

Less well-paying options:
- Science journalism, if you have a way with words and are good at telling a story and sniffing out interesting things to talk about
- Math/Science teaching. They're very much in need in public schools (although you might tear your hair out, depending on which district/location you're in).

But that aside, maybe it's just the type of work that you're doing. I nearly took a job at an analysis company before I realized that if I ever left engineering, it'd be very very hard to go back - going from engineering to something else, probably not as hard. Perhaps you should evaluate your surroundings (boss, coworkers, opportunities for additional training and advancement, other miscellaneous work variables) before making the leap. But sometimes people are dead sure, in which case, go for it, whatever "it" may be.
posted by universal_qlc at 4:07 PM on January 29, 2008

Oh, another one I forgot to mention: a number of people I know also became actuaries. For those who feel uncomfortable without a traditional career path, there's a series of tests to take to become fully qualified, with very well-defined test material for each. Yet another variant of the number crunching = well paid career.
posted by universal_qlc at 4:36 PM on January 29, 2008

If you want to help people more, you could keep being a mechanical engineer but do work more like these guys--from improving prosthetics to creating easily reproduceable technologies for developing world hospitals.
posted by hydropsyche at 4:50 PM on January 29, 2008

You could work for an environmental consulting firm - think LEED certification and the like - which is always heavily skewed toward mechanical; although perhaps that isn't a big enough leap.
posted by jamesonandwater at 5:23 PM on January 29, 2008

Or there's always working for a professional organization - doing membership work, editing the newsletter, running the board, education committee work, etc.
posted by jamesonandwater at 5:24 PM on January 29, 2008

Re: technical writing. You could probably get started in a new career in technical writing at a place like Boeing, where (at least some of) the writers are former engineers and engineering skills would be highly valued.
posted by crazycanuck at 5:29 PM on January 29, 2008

arbac....

OP doesn't need to go back to school to become a patent lawyer. It's one of the few legal jobs that demands an engineering degree and NOT a law degree. All he has to do is study for the patent bar. ( patbar )

OP may not like that job, but it usually pays well and is a good use of an engineering background.

Self-employment is also possible, and/or a slide over to civil engineering, which has a lot of similarities. Most of my civil engineering buddies do a fair amount of foundation and building work.

Architects don't require an engineering degree in many states, either...just working under another architect. States vary, but in NC, for instance, I think the requirement is 3 years. In Vermont, 7 years. (I am going from memory, so forgive me if the number is wrong, but the concept is not.)

An ME says you have good technical content, and the degree can be heavily enhanced with a PE certification opening up a lot of alternatives.

Getting an MBA will be a cakewalk by comparison to the ME.
posted by FauxScot at 5:54 PM on January 29, 2008

Based on the responses, I'd say offhandedly that you could volunteer with Engineers Without Borders and see if applying your technical know-how to helping people really trips your trigger.

Failing that, I'd echo the sentiments to seek out teaching. Many of my formative experiences that lead me down my path in life came from my high school physics and math teachers, which is exactly what you're most qualified to teach.
posted by conradjones at 8:06 PM on January 29, 2008

Orthopedic Surgeon. Biomedical Engineer.
posted by carabiner at 8:21 PM on January 29, 2008

seconding orthopedic surgeon. My mom knows a guy who was an engineer and decided to become a surgeon overnight. And that he's the best surgeon she knows of. (Nurse who worked in a recovery room.)

Failing that, try looking for something in your state's department of engineering. Perhaps knowing that you're protecting the public's safety and tax dollars will be enough?
posted by gjc at 8:34 PM on January 29, 2008

My brother was an ME, and is now an intellectual property attorney. He studied for and passed the patent bar before entering law school, but did the law degree as well, to allow him a broader range of options. It's definitely financially remunerative, and the variety of work available to him (he works for a medium-sized firm) seems to offer sufficient intellectual stimulation. If you are willing to take on the debt, short-term, a degree in IP law will pay for itself pretty quickly.
posted by mumkin at 9:23 PM on January 29, 2008

OP doesn't need to go back to school to become a patent lawyer. It's one of the few legal jobs that demands an engineering degree and NOT a law degree. All he has to do is study for the patent bar. ( patbar )

That's not entirely correct. Taking the patent bar allows you to be a patent agent. So you can draft patent applications and submit them to the USPTO without having a j.d. If you want to do any patent prosecution or patent litigation, you need to be an attorney as well.

Without the J.D., you're stuck working for a firm, drafting patent after patent. IMO boooooring. Its the prosecution/litigation aspects that's the fun part.
posted by Arbac at 9:34 PM on January 29, 2008

I stand corrected, Arbac! Thanks.

I do know the ME is the hard part, though! No calculus, physics, statics, dynamics, FEA, etc. in the JD. JD is also apparently a damned good thing to have ANYWHERE to make one more competitive, regardless of the job sought, and only takes three years.
posted by FauxScot at 5:28 AM on January 30, 2008